


Founders of the West

by TheSovereigntyofReality



Series: Transcendent Souls [5]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Divergence - Post-Avengers (2012), Child Death, Crossover, Gen, Iron Man is Better as a Solo Act, Man-Made Virus, Not Steve Friendly, Reference to Genocide Attempt, Team Tony, The Avengers are Not A Team, not SHIELD friendly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-06
Updated: 2019-01-23
Packaged: 2019-08-19 15:16:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 17,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16537082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSovereigntyofReality/pseuds/TheSovereigntyofReality
Summary: Tony is called to a hidden base underneath the ruins of Pompeii. Here, he meets one of the most important figures of human history.The X-Men encounter one of the oldest rivalries in human history.This is only the beginning and soon their worlds will be thrown together.





	1. The Call

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer: If you recognise it from outside this series, it isn't mine.**

**Approximately 300 Years Ago**  
‘Do it!’ a woman hissed. ‘Just do it!’

The Transcendent Soul in question looked over her shoulder. ‘But...’

‘This is the only way!’ the woman snarled. ‘Your Order are the only ones with the power.’ She broke into a coughing fit. As soon as she recovered, she rasped out, ‘If you don’t do this, they all die!’

She jammed her eyes shut. Then, slowly, she nodded.

***

 **Present Day (2013)**  
Tony Stark’s attention was drawn by JARVIS to a signal in the ruins of Pompeii – a signal that seemed to come from an extremely advanced computer system.

So, Tony went to check it out.

At the entrance of the city ruins, he was surprised to find a man waiting. He had dark hair and eyes and was dressed in outdoorsy gear. ‘Welcome, Tony Stark,’ he said in a distinct Greek accent. ‘My name is Tobias Metaxas.’

Tony pressed his lips together. ‘So, it was a lure then?’

‘Nothing nefarious, I assure you,’ Mr. Metaxas said. ‘It is more to the point that we wish to avoid drawing the attention of S.H.I.E.L.D. and ending up in their index.’

‘Index?’ Tony asked.

‘An index of enhanced, so to speak,’ Mr. Metaxas explained. ‘S.H.I.E.L.D. are so paranoid and power-hungry that they catalogue, capture, and kill enhanced simply because they are enhanced. Those who are captives generally end up in the Raft. They’re held in total secret and with no possibility of trial or escape – mostly because it’s underwater.’

‘What about Bruce?’ Tony asked.

‘Dr. Banner they believe they can control. If the enhanced agree to work for them, they are allowed to roam free, otherwise...’ Mr. Metaxas nodded his head. ‘Well, why do you suppose a couple of professional killers are on the Avengers roster?’

Tony hated to admit it, but he was right. He’d hack into S.H.I.E.L.D. again and look for this Raft, but right now he needed to see what they wanted to talk to him about. ‘So, you wanted to see me without S.H.I.E.L.D.’s interference?’

Mr. Metaxas smiled. ‘An associate of mine is ensuring they cannot observe us, and they remain oblivious to this fact. At the moment, they think you and Miss Potts are at a meeting in Japan.’

Tony let out a low whistle. ‘Now, that’s some serious hacking.’

‘Don’t be too impressed.’ Mr. Metaxas gestured for Tony to follow him and then led him into the city ruins. ‘This particular associate is a technopath. It’s a piece of cake, I believe the American expression is, for him to alter the computer code to tell S.H.I.E.L.D. something completely different from what is truly occurring. We’ve already confirmed that none of those monitoring your movements understand the precise meaning of the lines of computer code.’

Tony nodded. ‘Resourceful. How many are there of you?’

‘My particular group? 12. The person I’m taking you to, though, is representative of an entire sub-species of human who have been removed for their own safety. That is why we bring you here today.’

So they were asking him for help.

‘What do I call you?’ Tony asked as they walked through the ruins.

‘Toby.’

Toby took him to a set of ruins inside the city and down through a hidden hatch. They walked through a labyrinth of tunnels for what seemed like ages, Toby evidently knowing it like the back of his hand, before they hit the artificial lights. The dark tunnel became well lit and the natural structure soon gave way to the man-made.

Finally, they came into what appeared to be a computer lab of some description. Tony looked around. These computers were state-of-the-art and displaying various pieces of data – one included a comparison between Captain America and himself. Tony was surprised to see himself coming out on top there.

ROGERS, STEVEN GRANT:

COMPUTER ILLITERATE – SHOWN NO WILLINGNESS TO LEARN

NO EMPLOYMENT

GULLIBLE – BELIEVES WHAT HE’S TOLD WITH LITTLE-TO-NO QUESTIONING

HYPERCRITICAL – QUICK TO CONDEMN; RELUCTANT TO ALTER OPINIONS TO FIT FACTS

MALLEABLE – EASY TO MANIPULATE

EGOTISTICAL: PRONE TO GRANDOISE SPEECHES WHICH SERVE NO PURPOSE [SEE LOKI ALTERCATION (GERMANY)], CONSIDERS HIMSELF A SOLDIER DESPITE COMPLETING LESS THAN 1 WEEK OF BOOT CAMP.

AGRESSIVE; RESISTANT TO CHALLENGE – SEE INTERACTIONS WITH TONY STARK

LIKELINESS OF HELP: 2%

LIKELINESS TO BETRAY: 98%

With it written out like that, Tony was suddenly struck by what he’d seen of Cap. _Huh._ Cap had made a big speech at Loki for seemingly no reason. He had been quick to condemn Tony and what was it he said? “You may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero.” Tony had never thought of it from that perspective before.  
Seemed they didn’t buy into the legend.

Curious, Tony looked over at his own profile.

STARK, ANTHONY EDWARD:

ENGINEERING GENIUS – CURRENTLY HOLDS 6 PHDS; ASSOCIATED WITH GENII OF OTHER FIELDS.

CO-CEO OF STARK INDUSTRIES; HEAD OF R&D STARK INDUSTRIES

BUSINESSMAN. SOCIALLY AND POLITICALLY CONSCIOUS. AWARE OF LIES AND MANIPULATIONS. SLOW TO TRUST. REACTS BADLY TO BETRAYAL.

COMPASSIONATE. INTERACTS WITH COMMON MAN ON THE STREET.

EMPATHY: HIGH – SEE IVAN VANKO

PRONE TO SELF-DESTRUCTIVE TENDENCIES, ESPECIALLY IN HIGH STRESS SITUATIONS. SEE PALLADIUM POISONING 2010.

PRONE TO SELF-BLAME.

LESS LIKELY TO DEFEND SELF THAN TO DEFEND OTHERS – SEE STARK EXPO 2010, DATA FROM AVENGERS FORMATION 2012, MANDARIN INCIDENT 2013.

DESPITE PRIVILAGED BIRTH AND UPBRINGING, AVENGER MOST LIKELY TO WORK AND ADAPT; GIVE BENEFIT OF DOUBT.

LIKELINESS OF HELP: 99%

LIKELINESS TO BETRAY: 1%

‘Welcome, Mr. Stark.’

Tony looked at the woman who had spoken to him. She was tall with long dark red hair tied in a plait down her back. She was dressed rather casually and spoke in an accent he was entirely unfamiliar with. Her green eyes glittered in something like amusement, and a little something else. He wasn’t sure what, though.

‘Quite an interesting set of profiles there,’ Tony remarked, nodding his head towards it.

‘Hm.’ The woman looked over. ‘Not a popular opinion, I’ll admit but my own opinion is based on the data the Transcendent Souls were able to gather and transmit back to me.’

‘Transcendent Souls?’ Tony asked.

‘That’s what we are,’ Toby told him. ‘Myself and my 11 associates. We transcend death. Why is not currently important. What is important is that, as a benefit, we get an assortment of powers which allowed us access to this data.’ He gestured to the profiles.

Tony set that aside for now. ‘So what do you want from me?’ Tony asked.

The woman leaned over the console and hit a few buttons. Suddenly the computer behind her flared to life. ‘You are now looking at a string of my DNA. I know you’ve taken a swing at biology in your time. Do you notice anything unusual about it?’

Not overly. If Bruce was here, he probably would. Tony did however did notice one thing. ‘You’ve highlighted a section of it.’

‘That’s my X Gene,’ the woman said. ‘I like to think of it as the next step in evolution.’

‘What does the X Gene do?’ Tony asked.

‘It affords those with it to have powers. We’re still not sure about how the dispersal of powers is decided, but that is what happens. People with the X Gene are called mutants. I, for one, am from a particular sub-branch of mutant called lupines. I have no doubt you would have heard of both myself and my brother.’

Tony wondered who she could be.

‘I have a healing factor that has decelerated my ageing to the point that I am over 2000 years old.’ Then she answered his unasked question. ‘My name is Remus.’

For a moment, Tony froze. Then, when he did manage to speak, all he managed was. ‘Wow. Sexism at its finest.’

Toby snorted in amusement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know that Tony is listed to have 4 (I think) PhDs, but I figure he'd probably never stop earning them when the field of study got his attention.
> 
> In Break a Bad Habit, I mentioned that I found the meaning of Thanos's name looking up Greek names. At the time, I was trying to decide on Toby's name.
> 
> Romulus and Remus are not my own creations. They existed in the comics beforehand. I just tweaked them a bit.
> 
> ...Okay! I tweaked them a lot. ;)


	2. Virus X

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Remus explains her reasons for calling Tony to Pompeii.

Once Tony recovered from the fact that he was looking at one of the founders of western society, Remus led him into the back room. In the room, there was a set of tubes, set up and contained. They’d been specially isolated. Tony wouldn’t be affected by them, though. He walked in and looked around at the liquid.

‘What is this?’ Tony asked.

‘A man-made virus,’ Remus said. ‘It is specifically designed to attack the X Gene. I’m not sure how it was developed, especially in the 1700s, but that was its intention and that’s what it does.’

‘An accident, most likely,’ Tony mused.

‘Or…help from a more advanced civilisation,’ Remus said. ‘The Inhumans, after all, are the result of experiments of the Kree on early homo sapiens lifted from the African plains.’   
As a matter of fact, Remus was certain the architects of this virus had employed the help of extra-terrestrials in order to create this abomination.

Tony’s eyes narrowed. ‘Man-made viruses aren’t very common,’ he mused, pacing in front of it. ‘In science, they’re used to study the structure and functions of various diseases.   
This one, on the other hand – from the way you’re talking – seems to have been created with intent to kill.’ He looked at her. ‘Why?’

‘Intent to kill?’ Remus inclined her head. ‘Yes, very much so. They called us…call us mutants.’

‘Everyone’s a mutant,’ Tony said. ‘It’s what’s allowed us to survive as a species.’

Remus smiled at him. ‘Yeah, people tend to forget that when it comes to us.’

Tony’s eyes narrowed. ‘Racism. Like the Inhumans.’

‘Oh, we’re worse than the Inhumans, Mr. Stark,’ Remus said. ‘If they don’t want powers, they just opt out from exposure to terrigen mist. If we don’t want powers, tough. We have an emotional outburst in early puberty and bang.’ She clicked. ‘Congratualtions, kiddo. You’re a mutant.’

Tony shook his head. Already, Remus could see him grasping the implications and consequences on those poor kids. ‘There must be some sort of precursor; some indicator that it’s going to happen.’

‘If they have mutant parents, the parents will know to look out for it.’ Remus paused. ‘You can always tell those types, because the kids are warned that it could happen so when it does their first instinct is to run home, no matter where they are or what they’re doing. The problem is that most mutants are born to non-mutant parents.’

‘Shit,’ Tony murmured. ‘Don’t their parents...?’ he trailed off.

‘Very infrequently,’ Remus said. ‘Most mutants are either runaways or ex-cons, because they are rejected by everyone including their parents based on their mutations.’

Tony’s expression twisted in distaste for a moment. ‘So this is...?’

‘They called it Virus X,’ Remus said. ‘My mutation includes a healing factor – the best seen thus far, which is how I can be over two millennia old and look no more than 35. Still, I barely survived it. The mutants that surrounded me dropped dead from exposure. The same thing happened to my brother and the mutants around him. Like me, he has a healing factor and he survived. But the mutants trying to nurse him back to health were not as lucky.’

‘Is that why I’ve never heard of mutants?’ Tony asked. ‘Because this virus wiped them out?’

‘We did not allow it to go quite so far.’ Remus gestured over Tony’s shoulder. ‘As he said before, Toby is one of a group called the Transcendent Souls. They are what I believe is now called OP. Of course they are intended as the guardians of some of the most powerful artefacts in the universe. One of them had the reality-warping powers required to move the entirety of mutantkind, excluding myself, into a pocket dimension where they remain to this day.’

‘Why did you stay behind?’

‘Because someone needed to find a way to neutralise the virus.’ Remus looked him dead in the eye. ‘But I can’t do this by myself. I don’t have the biological knowledge required. That’s why we look for people to help us.’

‘And you think I can?’ Tony asked. ‘I’m an engineer.’

‘And maybe that’s what we need,’ Remus said.

‘Besides,’ Toby said. ‘You have a brilliant physicist living in your tower. Do you think he would help without betraying us?’

‘Yes,’ Tony said. ‘I do.’

Remus nodded. She walked over to the wall and took down a single vial of the virus. ‘I should warn you to act quickly. We didn’t get all of the virus. A small amount was stolen into the pocket universe. If they pick out a mutant to use it on, our efforts would have meant nothing at all.’

Tony just nodded.

***

 **Stark Tower, NY, USA**  
Bruce stared at the readings.

He agreed with Tony. If this wasn’t an accident, and it was looking distinctly like it wasn’t, then whoever had designed this thing had a little extra help. But it was disgusting.   
They’d done all this just to wipe out a species. It made Bruce want to puke, to be greatly honest.

It was even worse than Tony confirming the existence and function of the Raft, which Toby and Remus had told him about. Tony’s political knowledge was already being put to use. He’d aleady picked out a handful of inmates to show the public. He just had to work out how to oust the existence of the Raft to the general public. Given the number of “missing” children in there who’d suddenly and unexpectedly found themselves in possession of enhancements and then refused to work for a shady government organisation, inciting public outrage, Tony had explained, would be easy.

But Tony still had to tread cautiously. He didn’t want them being transferred to people like Ross.

So, while Tony tried to work out what to do about the Raft, and cut the both of them out of the Avengers – which included revoking the access to his tower for all the other members (especially Fury, Romanoff, and Barton) – Bruce worked on the problem of Virus X. And it was a very big problem.

Remus’s DNA gave him the structure and function of Gene X, but her exposure and subsequent recovery from the virus meant that she was immune. Her antibodies knew how to fight it off. The DNA from the mutants that had died from the virus, which she’d held onto, was fragile and liable to break. The hardest part of examining them was not damaging them.

When he did manage to examine them, he found the Gene X greatly damaged. It was still intact but it had been the source of the attacks. This, Bruce quickly came to understand, was a core part of mutant biology. Their Gene made them what they were. It was as crucial to them as their hearts. In some cases, it’d even stood in as a central organ like the heart. And this thing savagely attacked that.

He had to head into the Smash Room upon realising that.

With the understanding of what the virus did to these people, Bruce started looking into the stucture of the virus. What made it work and how was that reversed or neutralised? This whole thing would be far easier if he had a more stable sample group to work from – not of the virus, though. There was more than enough of that. It was the mutant DNA he needed.

Then Tony called him up to the penthouse.

It turned out Toby had called on two of the other Transcendent Souls to drop by.

‘Graciana Ibarra,’ Tony had said.

‘Grace,’ the Brazillian woman had tossed in.

‘And Sharee Pertinicle,’ Tony went on with a grin. ‘Sharee was the one who orginally created the pocket universe and put the mutants there.’

‘To be fair,’ Sharee, it would later turn out, was just from across the pond, ‘I had the entire order of the Masters of the Mystic Arts helping me. It’s a bit of a big job for one single person to do.’

‘Speak for yourself,’ Grace said with a grin.

Sharee laughed. She then spotted Bruce’s confused face. ‘Grace has got reverse reality manipulation. What we did to save mutantkind was, naturally, a form of reality manipulation. Once you guys work out how to neutralise the virus and put it into effect, she’s going to be bringing the mutants back.’ She looked up. ‘So how’s that going, by the way?’

Bruce nodded. ‘I’ve run into a few problems.’


	3. An Ancient Rivalry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The rivalry between the east and the west is an old one, and the mutants are about to discover just how old.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apocalypse only appears in this story as a way to introduce Romulus.

**Pocket Universe**  
Logan snarled and covered the kids nearest to him.

The debris flew overhead as Apocalypse ripped up every building in sight. Fighting him hadn’t worked. Sure, they’d managed to bat down all four of his “horsemen”, but the man himself seemed to be untouchable. He thought of himself as a God and the rest of mutantkind as beneath him. Hell! He thought nothing of killing other mutants in his way.  
Even the Brotherhood had been scattered around the battlefield, Magneto having decided to team them up with the X-Men for this fight.

‘Enough.’ Logan had been so focused on Apocalypse that he hadn’t even noticed the other guy’s arrival. But he sure as hell saw him shoot across and slash Apocalypse across the face with claws not unlike Logan’s – just without the metal and slightly different in position. They extended out from over his fingers, as if they were contained in his knuckles rather than between them.

Apocalypse recoiled. There were four gashes across his face. So far, the only wounds that’d taken were the ones that Logan himself had inflicted. The man landed and retracted his claws. Apocalypse slowly turned his head and looked at him. His eyes narrowed as the debris began to fall again.

The man spoke again as he gazed around at the rubble that’d once been the city centre. ‘Are you trying to make things worse for mutantkind?’ It was now that Logan noticed the man spoke in a peculiar accent. Logan had been around and he swore he’d heard every accent under the sun. But this accent was a new one. ‘Because using your mutation to rip the place up is how you make things worse.’

Apocalypse snarled. ‘Romulus.’

Romulus? Wasn’t that...? Logan cocked an eyebrow and studied the man.

‘Do you deny that humanity has gotten above itself?’ Apocalypse snarled.

Romulus snorted. ‘Humanity survived this long because it developed the reflex to think the absolute worst. “There’s a tiger over there. It might eat me”. And humans like to feel safe – so do mutants, come to think of it but we don’t have that option. They’ll always have to pick on somebody to persecute. From the colonial era to the sixties, it was non-whites. In the Roman Empire, it was Christians. It just happens to be our turn.’

Apocalypse snarled. ‘You never change.’

‘Nor do you.’ Romulus smirked. ‘You still think you’re a God who can play judge, jury, and executioner.’

Apocalypse spread his arms. A huge chunk of debris flew at Romulus. The pale-haired mutant flipped it over his head with barely a backwards glance. ‘You’re not a God, Er Subur Nur,’ he said. ‘You are a mutant like any other. An exceptionally powerful one, I grant you, but still just a mutant.’

‘I created civilisation,’ Apocalypse snarled. ‘And I can destroy it.’

‘You created eastern civilisation,’ Romulus said. ‘We created the western one. But when I started going off the rails, I had a sister to stab me and reel me back in.’

Logan almost snorted. With the way mutations went, he probably meant that literally.

Romulus cocked his eyebrow. ‘Who did you have to deflate _your_ head again? Oh, yeah. No one.’ He paused and then looked back at the X-Men. ‘Man, when Remus isn’t here, I can be a real jerk.’

A number of the kids giggled.

‘And where is the dear lady?’

Romulus snorted. ‘Oh, come on. You hate her guts. She’s about half of my size and still kicks your butt.’

Logan had been wondering. This Romulus guy couldn’t have just been standing there, talking for no reason. He’d been right. Apparently, Romulus had been carrying on two conversations. He’d been distracting Apocalypse with a vocal conversation while he’d been telepathically speaking to the Professor. Sneaky.

And kind of impressive.

 _His sister,_ the Professor told them, _is currently unavaliable to help him as she usually does. He needs us to pick up the slack._

The Professor gave them instructions as Romulus began to circle Apocalypse. He really was sneaky. That would draw Apocalypse’s attention away from them so he never saw the children shifting back and the X-Men beginning to move into their own offensive positions. Logan hopped up to scale some debris, enough to give him a higher vantage point. His job, as usual, was more force than anything else.

_Romulus and his sister are the same sub-species of mutant as you are, Logan. There’s a weak point in Apocalypse’s armour._

And Logan was going to be exploiting that.

‘Right.’ Romulus finished his prattle once he saw them all where he needed them to be. ‘Let’s get this show on the road, shall we?’ He shot forward and, without bothering to extend his claws, punched Apocalypse straight in the mug. The purple oaf spun around, giving Logan the perfect opening.

 _SNIKT!_ Logan dived. His claws sliced inbetween the armour and into the flesh of the ancient mutant. He tore, and the armour went flying away from him. As the blood of the ancient touched his hands, there was an odd tingle that Logan was momentarily concerned about. Apocalypse screamed and spun around, swatting at Logan. The impact sent Logan flying back, his body already healing before it made contact with the ground.

Immediately, lightning shot out of the air and hit Apocalypse’s unprotected body and Cyclops fired his lasers right at the big eye-sore, inflicting even more damage. Gambit spun his powers through, throwing Apocalypse through a pile of debris that the ancient himself had made. Jean finished him off, pinning him flat with her telekinesis.

Apocalypse spat blood, but he was completely immobile.

Romulus walked over to him, eyes narrowing. ‘Remus isn’t able to make it, so I was slightly concerned about how I was going to take you down. I should thank you for involving the X-Men.’ He looked at the X-Men. ‘And I should thank you for your help.’

‘Not at all,’ Chuck said. ‘He did attack our home, after all.’

Romulus nodded, looking supremely unimpressed. ‘I guess I’ll have to put him back in his box then.’

‘Why don’t you just kill him?’ Magneto asked, sounding put upon. Seemed he didn’t like the disregard Apocalypse had for mutant life. Certainly, Apocalypse didn’t care who he killed – be they human or mutant – in his megalomaniacal little quest to re-establish himself as a God in the world.

Romulus smirked. ‘Because one of his powers is immortality. He _can’t_ be killed.’

And that Magneto couldn’t argue with.

Romulus flicked out his claws and swiftly stabbed Apocalypse through the head, effectively rendering him unconscious. As he lifted his hand and retracted his claws, Logan spotted the blood on his hand that had come from the other ancient mutant. He supposed it wouldn’t hurt to ask.

‘Is there something different about his blood?’

Romulus grinned at him. ‘Yeah, it’s a bit redundant to us, though. His blood is capable of healing other mutants. But it’s lethal to non-mutants.’

That, of course, piqued Chuck’s interest. ‘Jean, will you gather the spilled blood for further study?’

As Jean did as asked, Romulus pulled an odd-looking whistle out of his pocket with a wince. He glanced at Logan in particular before he gave his warning. ‘If your mutation includes enhanced hearing, cover your ears.’

Logan lifted his hands to his ears and pressed down. Several of the other mutants followed suit. Romulus, looking like he’d rather do anything but, lifted the whistle to his lips and blew. Even though his ears were blocked, Logan gritted his teeth. The sound the whistle made was high pitched and piercing. It was also beyond the typical hearing range for a human. Logan was sure, if his ears weren’t covered, they might’ve just started bleeding.

Romulus pulled the whistle down and said, ‘Give me a few minutes before I can hear you again.’

In the next instant, what looked like stone slabs sailed down and quickly encased Apocalypse. Once he was back in the casket, it sunk into the ground. Logan was curious how he’d managed that. But, knowing how mutations went, it was probably something set up by a mutant however long ago they first managed to lock the guy away.

Chuck waited the appropriate time. ‘How did you do that?’

‘It took about three mutants,’ Romulus said. ‘One was a geokinetic, one was a telekinetic, and one was a low-level cosmokinetic.’

‘And you do this...every time?’ Storm asked.

‘Yes,’ Romulus said. ‘Usually, though, I have my sister to help me. Her fighting style is much more unpredictable than mine.’ He paused. ‘And she’s better at lateral thinking.’

‘So why wasn’t she here this time?’ Cyclops asked.

Romulus paused. ‘Well...it isn’t exactly something I should be talking about in a public space.’

Chuck then frowned. ‘Pocket dimension?’

‘Oh, a telepath.’ Romulus shrugged. ‘I’m afraid so, sir.’


	4. The Attempted Genocide

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Romulus explains.

They all gathered in the room – the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants.

‘It started back in the 1700s.’ Romulus was sitting back with his feet up. ‘Specifically when, I do not know. It came to our attention, though, in 1789. We’d noticed that a chunk of mutants in a particular region had been dropping dead, so we went to investigate.’

‘What did you find out?’ Scott asked.

‘A virus,’ Romulus answered. ‘A _man_ -made virus.’ He paused. ‘Well, I probably shouldn’t say man-made. It was designed to target the mutant gene specifically. Genetic science was unknown back then, so it was either a fluke or they had help from a more advanced society. Either way, we ended up quarantining the victims.’

‘That makes sense,’ Hank said. ‘If there was a virus targeting the mutant gene, the first response would be to isolate the afflicted from other mutants.’

‘Hell, we had to isolate them entirely,’ Romulus said. ‘Non-mutants can become asymptomatic carriers of the disease.’

‘That wouldn’t have stopped it from spreading,’ Logan stated. ‘Traders would have travelled through the region before you got there and worked out what was going on. They would have picked it up and carried it on.’

‘You’re not wrong,’ Romulus said. ‘We had to call upon the help of a small and select group of people in order to stop the extinction of mutantkind.’

‘Who?’ Magneto asked.

‘They are called the Transcendent Souls,’ Romulus said. ‘As the name suggests, they transcend death. That is to say when they die, they are simply reborn. They generally reincarnate into places where something interesting is happening.’

‘How can people like that exist?’ Hank asked.

‘Long story, but the long and short of it is they get a new power each every seventh lifetime they have. If they begin to abuse these powers, however, the powers are stripped away overnight.’

‘And how would you define “abuse”?’ Mystique asked.

Romulus kept his head down to hide his smirk. ‘Oh, you know...using the powers to assert dominance over others, beginning to think that other people are somehow inferior to them, using their powers to gain an unfair advantage over the opposition in any conflicts that do not pertain to the reason they got their powers in the first place.’

‘So basically what the Brotherhood do on a regular basis,’ Jean surmised.

‘Oh, did I just describe your MO?’ Romulus asked Magneto, not without amusement.

‘Get on with it,’ Magneto said.

‘Right.So, the virus, which we called Virus X, targeted the mutant gene and killed within a few days, with all the appearance of influenza. As you said, Logan, it did spread very quickly, which was why we had to call in the Transcendent Souls. One of them had discovered a power which, for simplicity’s sake, was referred to as the mystic arts. She’d also discovered that this power could be tapped into by certain baseline humans. So she trained them and eventually helped form an order called the Masters of the Mystic Arts. Reality warping falls under their powerset.’

‘I see,’ Charles said. ‘And they created a pocket universe. In this universe they placed all of the unafflicted, whether they be mutant or not.’

‘Yes,’ Romulus said. ‘I came here when my body finished purging the virus from itself, with the help of the Transcendent Soul in question. My job is to make sure the mutants here aren’t killed too. My sister stayed on the other side after she recovered to try and find a way to neutralise the virus.’

Logan frowned. ‘So the healing factor does nothing against this thing?’

‘Well, I wouldn’t say “nothing”,’ Romulus said.

Logan nodded. ‘Obviously. You’re still alive.’ That was true, and so was his sister (they could safely assume), and both of them had healing factors it seemed. ‘So it keeps you alive, but I bet it still wrecks havok with the healing factor. How long did it take you to recover from the blow?’ It was a valid question, and one both the X-Men and the Brotherhood were eager to hear the answer to.

‘A couple of years,’ Romulus said. ‘As you said, it wrecks havok on the healing factor. To the point where it actually shut down for a couple of years, for me. Aged faster in that time that I ever did in a thousand years. And I do mean that literally.’

‘So the rest of mutantkind certainly wouldn’t stand a chance,’ Xavier said. ‘I see why these Transcendent Souls made the decision they did. Do you have any updates from the main universe.’

‘Um.’ Romulus looked thoughtful and pulled a slip of paper out of his back pocket. ‘World War II, a holocaust survivor escaped Germany to America with a serum that enhances everything about a person. Due to having a sample already stolen and used on a megalomanic against his will he refused to let anyone else pick out the candidate and he ended up picking out a kid that resonated with him than one who was actually appropriate.’

‘That’s very specific,’ Remy remarked.

‘That’s what Remus wrote down,’ Romulus said. ‘Also, he ended up crashing a plane into the Arctic somehwere after his best friend fell from a train and allegedly died. Remus thinks he could have easily escaped the plane.’

Logan huffed. ‘So it was a suicide dive.’

‘Looks that way. Apparently, over the years, people have been trying to recreate the effect, with...varying results.’

‘Are you telling me,’ Mystique demanded incredulously, ‘that homo sapiens are giving _themselves_ powers?’

‘Better get used to it, honey,’ Romulus said. ‘Its happened for centuries.’

***

Logan sat back with a beer, watching the TV.

Chuck had invited Romulus to stay a while. Logan imagined it was partially the novelty of having one of the founders of western society in his home. The other part, Logan was sure, was that Romulus had direct access to the information pertaining to their main universe, which meant he knew when they had to bolt down the doors, so to speak.

And there was an interesting thought: they’d lived all their lives (even him) in a pocket universe, kind of like a quarrantine field.

With a huff, Romulus plopped on the other end of the couch. ‘What are you watching?’

‘Damned if I know. Some late night thing.’ Logan took a drag of his cigar. ‘So how old do we get?’

‘Differs from one lupine to another. Depends on the healing factor, really. Someone who takes a minute to heal will have a shorter life than someone who heals the instant the damage is inflicted.’ He sniffed. ‘Although, to be fair, your lifespan has probably been cut down by that metal in your body.’

‘By how long?’

‘Well, what metal is it?’

‘Adamantium.’

‘About 400 years shorter.’ Romulus then looked him over. ‘Your natural lifespan, judging from your looks and your assumed actual age, would have been anywhere between 800 to 1000 years.’

‘I’m not sure how 400 to 600 years is better.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the comic where Romulus and Remus featured, Logan's sub-branch of mutant were called "lupine" or "homo lupus", hence why they're being referred to that way in this story.


	5. Exposed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The time has come for S.H.I.E.L.D.'s dirty laundry to be aired.

**Main Universe**  
It started with an anonymous hacker.

Tony would swear to the ends of the Earth he had nothing to do with it. The truth was, he didn’t. Pepper watched in satisfaction as the world reacted to the footage of the Raft and the inmates, which included both adults and children. There were public protests all over the world, screaming for the Raft to be opened and the prisoners released for a fair trial. Why were they locked up? What were their crimes? What reason could you have for putting children and adults in a hidden facility?

And then – oops! – people starting recognising some of the inmates. Familiy members and friends identified different people as missing persons that they had been searching for, hoping to see again, for years. Then it became very obvious that the Raft was in no way a _legal_ holding facility. People stopped demanding that the prisoners get trials and started demanding those in control of the Raft be put on trial.

Already, when Tony didn’t answer their calls, S.H.I.E.L.D. had tried to break in three times. And JARVIS, with help from the technopath Transcendent Soul, Zhen, had blocked all of their hacking attempts – which had been tried all three times – and used the Iron Legion to boot them out, displaying the competance in which Tony’s defence force worked.

At first, Pepper hadn’t been sure about the Iron Legion but then she’d spoken to Sharee.

‘There was one invasion,’ Sharee had said. ‘It was only stopped because they happened to work out where it was going to happen before it started, and contained it. That was luck. We can’t count on it next time, because there will be a next time. When has a war ever ended after one battle? When has a conquerer ever stopped after one failed invasion?’

And that was a good point.

Thoughout history, if the first attack failed the force would just try again. Pretending it was over and done with was beyond stupid. Then Sharee had revealed something else – something that determined that this wasn’t over. Oh, no, not by a long shot. Upon hearing of the effects of the sceptre Loki was using, she’d walked out of the room.

Sharee had returned hours later, twirling the sceptre and declared. ‘You know, HYDRA had this?’

Tony and Bruce had looked alarmed.

‘How...did that happen?’ Tony finally managed.

‘Odds are that HYDRA’s buried itself in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s ranks. Kolya’s looking into it.’ Pepper assumed that must’ve been another Transcendent Soul. Sharee went on. ‘As for the eyes...’ Yes, Pepper had been wondering about that orange glow that had taken over her irises. Sharee grinned. ‘...well, it turns out that the sceptre houses the mind stone.’

‘The what?’ Bruce asked.

‘Take cover.’ Sharee suddenly brought the sceptre down on the edge of the table. Tony, Pepper, Rhodey, Happy, and Bruce ducked. A wave of forceful energy burst out. Quite a few frames were knocked down and bits and pieces were sent flying. Pepper was really glad she’d had no paperwork in the room.

When they straightened up, Sharee was leaning on the table she’d brought the sceptre down onto and reaching down. From the shattered glass, she picked up a small glowing yellow stone. She grinned as she held it up. ‘I present to you, the Mind Stone – one of the six Infinity Stone and definitive proof that we do have another invasion coming. And quite a big one. We’ll want those mutants back sooner than later.’

‘How do you mean?’ Bruce asked. ‘What are the Infinity Stones?’

‘The six Infinity Stones,’ Sharee said. ‘No one knows where they came from, just that they’re phenomenally powerful. In fact, one of them – the Soul Stone specifically – is the reason that the Transcendent Souls exist in the first place. We’re technically a defence for them. If all six are gathered by a single person, that person could rewrite the entire universe to their whim. There was already one permanently on Earth.’

‘That’s why you formed the Order,’ Tony realised.

‘Exactly. And now...’ Sharee closed her fist around the Mind Stone, ‘...we have two. Whoever it is obviously has more.’

Rhodey nodded. ‘Because they were comfortable enough to send one of the Stones down here with Loki?’

‘Precisely. And that’s big trouble.’ She stood up. ‘So I have a few phone calls to make.’

‘To who?’ Pepper asked.

‘The other Transcendents,’ Sharee said. ‘If someone’s collecting the Infinity Stones, then we have a job to do.’

***

Fury (no pun intended) was furious.

Somehow word of the Raft had gotten out. Now, despite what some agents (like Romanoff and Hill) thought, Fury sincerely doubted Stark had anything to do with it. Stark didn’t even know about the Raft prior to the information dropping. He’d, in fact, responded to it by cutting all contact with S.H.I.E.L.D.

And, it turned out, his AI had been doing so much more than just hacking S.H.I.E.L.D. All their attempts to hack the AI – which had never failed before – were suddenly falling flat. Stark and Banner were suddenly out of reach. The one message he had gotten from Stark had given him nothing except:

_Make an appointment like everybody else._

At first, it had seemed like they’d be able to control it without Stark. But then...well, people started identifying the inmates – children, parents, brothers, sisters, cousins, friends. Once that happened, Fury found himself on a fast-sinking ship. The press jumped on the illegal incarceration and the President caved, revealing S.H.I.E.L.D.’s existence and turning the public outrage on them.

Fury would like to agree with Romanoff and say that Stark was saving face by cutting contact with them, but that wasn’t it. Even though Rogers association with an organisation like S.H.I.E.L.D. had wrecked his standing and credibility (people were insisting he couldn’t be the real Steve Rogers but just a look-alike that’d been juiced up), that wasn’t why Stark pulled back. It was because he was protecting Banner.

He worried about them throwing Banner into the Raft too so he’d called on all of his power and privilage and blocked them from coming anywhere near him. Despite what Romanoff thought, Stark, like his father before him, had always been more concerned with the people around him than with himself.

Fury eyed Rogers across the room. ‘Well?’ he demanded.

The super-soldier had been standing there, glaring at him for a prolonged period of time.

‘Why are they saying on the radio that I’m a fake?’ he demanded. ‘I want to know who started these rumours and I want them punished.’

Fury rolled his eye. As if anyone could know that! ‘Look, Rogers, it’s not something anyone can trace. It happened in your birth century too. One person suggests an idea and then everyone believes it. And, frankly, I was expecting it.’

Rogers scowled. ‘Why?’ he demanded as if Fury was personally responsible.

‘You’ve been gone for 70 years, Rogers,’ Fury said, making sure to insert the obviousness of the situation into his voice. ‘You were in your twenties when you went down. That puts you in your 90s. And then you just show up, looking not a day older? Of course people are sceptical.’

That shit with the Raft didn’t help either.

Already, the Raft had been taken out of his hands. The inmates were being extracted and reviewed. Many of them had already been sent back home to their families, despite the powers they had. All of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s authority and powers had been shut down and several agents had also been arrested for violations of human rights – starting with the ones manning the Raft.

And now Fury had to worry about them investigating S.H.I.E.L.D. and discovering just how far they’d gone for the greater good.

The public would never understand.

***

SI’s legal team had discovered, buried deep in the database, and programmed to surface when the world learned of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s existence, a letter from Howard Stark to Tony Stark. The letter was delivered to the joint CEO office that Tony and Pepper shared. While there was only one desk in it (as Pepper tackled all the administrative duties while Tony handled the “fun” aspects of running a company as SI), both of them technically laid claim to it.

When it got to Tony, he sat down to read it.

At the end, he sat back and rubbed his hands over his face.

‘Tony?’ Pepper asked.

Tony sighed. ‘Dad didn’t tell me about S.H.I.E.L.D., and did everything to keep me away from it, in order to give me plausible deniability.’

‘He knew it was going to be discovered?’ Pepper asked.

‘He suspected, at least,’ Tony said. ‘And he knew his part in it would be uncovered when that happened. He didn’t want me to get hit by the backlash.’

‘Well, he was running an arms company,’ Pepper said. ‘The kind of trouble he’d have gotten into if he was caught involved in an organisation like S.H.I.E.L.D...’

Tony sighed again. ‘Yeah.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As for who the hacker was: either JARVIS or Zhen. Take your pick.


	6. Suspicious Activity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Professor and Hank notice something off in a particular warehouse.

**Pocket Universe**  
‘So there is actually a sample of the virus here?’ Logan asked. ‘Why haven’t they released it yet then?’

Romulus smiled and lined up his shot. ‘From their perspective – granted, I don’t know who “they” are – the virus started and then it suddenly stopped. We’ve been assured that they haven’t the faintest idea what happened and they’ve spent the last 300 years trying to work it out. I imagine they’ve tested it on mutants they managed to catch and can’t work out how the virus was stopped last time.’ He struck the white ball and watched it roll across the green-surfaced table to another two.

Not exactly a pleasing thought. ‘So we’re at a stalemate. Won’t stay like that forever.’

‘Certainly not. Fortunately, this universe and that one progress, technologically speaking, at the same pace. I’m not going to say for certain that Remus is going to get it done before they try releasing the virus again, or before the next check-in, because the minute you think you’re invulnerable, you’re actually standing there with your pants around your ankles.’

Logan’s eyebrow twitched at the mental image, but he chose to ignore the figure of speech. ‘Check-in?’ He leaned over and took his shot.

‘Hm.’ Romulus leaned on his pool cue. ‘That Transcendent that did the initial split comes in every 50 years or so to make sure we’re all still here and tell me what’s going on on my sister’s end. I’m not expecting her for a another decade, give or take a few years.’

‘How’s that even work?’ Logan asked. ‘Does the Soul just jump into a new body when the person dies?’

‘Not so much,’ Romulus said. ‘From what I understand, when a foetus is in the early stages of development, they don’t actually have a soul. If one doesn’t take up residence it begins to develop in the third trimester. So their disembodied souls go to a country where something interesting is happening and then get close enough to a developing foetus to get absorbed into the flesh.’

‘So I suppose they look different every lifetime?’

‘Yup.’

‘Then why are you so certain this one will be a woman?’

Romulus chuckled. ‘Because apparently, they can tell that from a distance. Don’t ask me how. And they all have preferences. This particular one has a preference for being born female. I think she likes being underestimated.’

Logan snorted. ‘I doubt they’d smell the same so how do you know them when you see them?’

‘Their mannerisms, mostly. I think it comes from millennia of living over and over again. They all have a very distinct way of talking and walking, and standing. Trust me, once you meet them you know them no matter what body they occupy; no matter how they smell.’

They both looked up as Charles suddenly sent a telepathic call out.

‘I guess we’ll continue the game at a later date.’

***

Charles looked up as the door opened and Logan and Romulus walked in.

Logan, Charles knew, rather enjoyed sparring with Romulus. He liked not having to hold back, espeicially when he was frustrated about something. It was also interesting to note that Logan’s lifespan was far longer than they’d anticipated – with and without the adamantium. But, be that as it may, there was an issue to look at.

As soon as they were all present, Charles and Hank explained what had drawn their attention.

At the end, Scott frowned. ‘So we need to check out this facility then? See if there are kids there?’

Charles went to answer, and then he looked at Romulus curiously as he picked up the Hold on.

Romulus shook his head. ‘It looks a little too much like a trap. I not only have seen people doing this in warfare over the years, but I, I’m ashamed to say, did it a few times. You get a bunch of kids, let the adults think they’re in danger, or legitimately put them in danger, and the village or region’s protectors will all walk right into your little ambush.’

‘So you think this is an ambush?’ Storm asked.

‘I would be shocked if it isn’t,’ Romulus said. ‘Probably for us. Those leaks seem a little too intentional for my tastes.’

‘So what do you expect us to do?’ Scott demanded. ‘Just leave them there?’

Charles winced. Scott prided himself on having been trained as the leader of the X-Men since his adolescence. But he was still young, and he was still prone to making silly mistakes. Romulus – who had actually been an emperor at one point – and, to a point, Logan both made him feel threatened in that regard. That was the part of the reason he was so defensive around them.

Romulus gave him a bland look. ‘Don’t be so thick! Of course not.’

***

This, Logan mused, would be Romulus’s plan.

Of course, sneak in through the vents while the others kept back. Of course, Romulus had all of them stay back at the mansion while he and Logan crossed the country and then walked up to this place, before ducking around the back and slipping in through the ventilation shafts. The two men sniffed out what they were looking for.

Neither of them liked what their noses were telling them, but they kept moving.

Finally, Logan kicked the appropriate ventilation panel out – it was all sealed up, but the smell of the kids was getting through – and hopped down into the room. Romulus was quick to follow him. Both of them viewed the sight in front of them with curled lips and flared nostrils. There were six of them, all between the ages of 12 and 17. But they were all slumped on the floor, unmoving.

They were all dead.

‘Chuck and Hank said they were alive,’ Logan remarked.

‘No blood and no wounds on them.’ Romulus began to circle the children, who seemed to have just died where they lay. He knelt down and leaned over one of them. He sniffed twice and stood up, looking annoyed. ‘I was afraid of that.’

‘The virus?’ Logan asked. At the other mutant’s nod, he cocked an eyebrow. ‘It works that quick?’ They’d only found out ten hours ago.

‘No,’ Romulus said. ‘It’ll generally kill you in about three to four days.’ He pointed to the sealed door of the windowless room. ‘The air we’re breathing now is the air they were breathing, and it’s been trapped in this room. If any of the others had been here, it would have been a death sentence. I said it seemed like the leak was intentional.’

‘They wanted us to come after the kids, so we’d come in here and all get infected.’ Logan looked down. ‘And you said it killed with all the appearance of the flu, so by the time we worked it out, it’d be too late.’

‘Precisely.’

Logan looked down at his hands. ‘How long until I start feeling it?’

‘A few hours,’ Romulus said. ‘It’ll start out as a sniffle. Tomorrow morning, you’ll really feel it.’

‘In the meantime, I can’t go near any other mutants.’ Knowing the Professor would most likely be paying attention to this, Logan thought, _You getting this, Chuck?_

_I’m listening, yes._

‘Pretty much.’ Romulus sighed and ran a hand through his hair. ‘Of course, we need to stop this from spreading but I can hardly leave you in a room of rotting corpses, can I?’

The silence that followed was interrupted when a golden glowing circle soon appeared in the wall. Logan’s hand automatically curled into a fist and he slid a foot back. He looked at Romulus and was surprised to see the other mutant merely had his eyebrows raised. A person then stepped through the golden circle – a woman in her late 20s or early 30s with long medium brown hair and hazel-green eyes. Those eyes immediately focused in on the dead children.

‘You’re early,’ Romulus remarked.

‘Remus thinks she found some guys who can and will find a counteractant, and I agree.’ The woman spoke in an accent local to the state of Connecticut. She looked down at the children again. ‘And just in the nick of time from the looks of this.’

‘Yeah, I smelt a rat,’ Romulus said. ‘Looks like a new body. I guess it’s not Greta Haumann anymore.’

‘Nope.’ She popped the last syllable of the word as she rubbed her earlobe and looked around the room. ‘It’s Sharee Pertinicle. So it’s gone no farther than these four walls? They just intended to draw a bunch of mutants into this room, get infected, and walk out with the epidemic none the wiser?’

‘That’s it in a nutshell.’ He inclined his head. ‘She found someone?’

There was a file in Sharee’s hand. ‘She had two options.’ She flicked it out. ‘That was them.’

Romulus took the file and opened it. He glanced between the pages. ‘Hm,’ he mused sarcastically. ‘Tough choice.’ He flicked it shut and looked at Logan. ‘Apparently, my sister found a genius billionaire philanthropist to help us.’

‘Yeah,’ Sharee said. ‘His team just needs more data. They need to know what makes the virus work before they can work out how to counteract it. The tissue samples they do have are 300 years old and tell them very little.’

‘Can you trust them?’ Logan asked.

‘Yes,’ Sharee said. ‘They don’t differentiate between baseline and mutant. To them, you are all human and are entitled to the same rights.’

Logan would have to trust that.

‘What d’you say, Logan?’ Romulus said. ‘Feel like giving them some fresh tissue?’

‘Not particularly,’ Logan said, ‘but that’s what needs to be done.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was actually thinking about this. Should the Transcendent Souls always be the same gender?
> 
> But then I realised that in Break a Bad Habit and the modern stories in this series, I already did that so I had to have an explanation for that. I hope this is sufficient.


	7. Fevered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Logan contracts the virus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry. Logan's only sick for a few chapters.

**Main Universe**  
The first thing Logan noticed about these people, after he followed Sharee through the portal with the six bodies, was that she hadn’t been just saying that. They did regard mutants equally to humans. Because Logan was the only living one of them, they asked him for consent before taking the DNA samples from the kids.

Tony Stark, when Logan had seen him, had taken one look at the kids and his eyes had gone like coal. Logan had smelt the rage pouring off him but there were only a few subtle outward signs of such: a stiffening in the posture, a cord of steel running through his voice as he directed his assembled team, and of course the look in his eyes.

Logan knew he was the patient of the most interest – and, yes, they referred to him as a patient rather than a subject.

Dr. Banner and Dr. Cho both told him what they were doing before they did it. Even though he was sick as a dog, Logan listened and he could hear them so he knew that they never deviate from what they told him. Although, in a place this big – seemed to be more of a tower than a conventional house – it was likely their voices were being projected to him over anything else.

That was especially true when he heard them talking about an impending attack.

This was, of course, despite the throbbing in his head.

His body poured out sweat. At the same time, he couldn’t stop shivering. He couldn’t eat much, and what he did eat usually ended up in the bucket that sat beside his bed. Shit, Logan had forgotten what it had been like to actually be sick. Sure, intellectually he knew that. His body worked differently, so he’d forgotten what these senstions felt like. But knowing something intellectually and being physically confronted by it were two different things.

Logan opened his eyes and lifted his sore arm from over them when he heard someone talking as they approached the room. One person was Rhodes – Logan didn’t even need to see the guy standing in his uniform to know he was in military command. The other person had a particular accent that Logan had a very good idea who it was.

‘...just in this room,’ Rhodes was saying, ‘but I guess you know that.’

‘Yes,’ the woman said. ‘How close are we to a cure?’

‘Despite the circumstances, the DNA we’ve gotten from Logan and from those kids has allowed Dr. Banner and Dr. Cho to make leaps and bounds. Tony’s started looking better, and he’s even talking about _how_ to disperse the counteractant.’

‘I am pleased to hear it,’ the woman remarked. ‘Thank you, colonel.’ So he _was_ military command. Logan dropped his arm back over his eyes.

A moment later, the woman lightly knocked on the door and pushed it open. ‘Are you asleep?’ she asked, keeping her voice soft.

‘Nuh,’ Logan mumbled, not bothering to raise his voice to be heard. He waited until he heard the door click shut before moving his arm so he could get a look at her.

She was about the same height as Romulus but her hair was dark red, long, and tied in a plait down her back. Romulus had said his sister was half his size. Turned out he meant in bulk. While he was thick in muscles, she wasn’t. But he didn’t doubt she was just as strong. They must’ve been fraternal twins. ‘You Remus?’

‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘And you’re Logan.’

He nodded...and immediately had to roll over for the bucket. Logan couldn’t actually remember vomiting between his mutation manifesting and contracting the virus. He’d misremembered how awful it felt. He wasn’t fond of rediscovering the experience. As he was tossing his cookies, he heard Remus walk over to him. She rested a hand on his back and waited him out.

When he finished losing his lunch, Remus handed him the bottle of water and took the bucket into the room’s ensuite. Logan drained nearly the entirety of the bottle as he listened to Remus clean out the bucket. When he finished, he laid back down and did his best not to move. But he did ask.

‘So why did Sharee come to the pocket dimension early?’

It sounded like she didn’t stop or even pause in what she was doing. ‘The lack of usable mutant DNA. She was hoping Romulus could secure her some more for Banner and Cho. So she ducked back over early.’

‘Her timing was a bit...’

‘Yeah, Transcendent Souls do that. I think it’s intervention from the Soul Stone.’

‘Soul Stone?’

‘One of the six Infinity Stones. I’m not sure how much Romulus told you, but it’s the thing that created the Transcendent Souls in the first place. They’re meant to be a defence mechanism so that nobody gets all six Stones.’

That made sense. He had mentioned that they had to earn their powers. They had those things for a reason – unlike mutants, who just had that particular gene. Speaking of which, Logan closed his eyes again. Sharee and someone else were coming towards the room. He couldn’t smell them anymore, cause his sinuses were stuffed up. But he could hear them walking. Romulus was right. Once you knew what to look for, the Transcendent Souls were really easy to spot.

There were two of them approaching, with their very distinct stride.

Remus came out as they knocked and walked in. ‘Brazillian this time?’ Remus asked.

‘You’re getting good at that,’ the other woman said. ‘Name’s Grace.’

‘Where’s Toby?’ Sharee asked.

‘Stayed behind to clean up,’ Remus said. ‘He’ll be along later.’ Hearing paper rustle, Logan cracked his eyes open and saw Remus pull a newspaper out of her jacket pocket. ‘While you’re here, what’s the deal with this?’

Logan didn’t see the article she opened to and handed over, but he saw Sharee smirk and nod. ‘Well, Helen and Bruce think they’ve got the counteractant. Tony’s gonna disperse it from machines he’s temporarily placed in all of his factories. Tony figured it would be better to give the public an explanation for these factories to be spewing out an odd-coloured gas than to risk international relations.’

‘And the CDC approved it?’

‘We did provide them with the dormant samples of the virus, active samples, and the kids’ bodies.’ Sharee rubbed the end of her nose. ‘It was a bit awkward as we didn’t know who any of those kids were. Turned out those assholes took all their personal effects. However, there was evidence of violence on their bodies before they died. Added in where Logan and Romulus found them and they’ve been listed as kidnapping victims. The police are currently looking for their families.’

‘They won’t have much luck,’ Remus said exactly what Logan was thinking.

‘Not until I re-merge the universes, no,’ Grace said. ‘Anyway, so the CDC has listed it as a man-made virus likely made by a criminal faction. Logan, just so you know, you’ve been listed down as the only known still-living victim.’

‘Noted,’ he mumbled.

‘So the CDC are fully in favour of what we’re doing here.’

A thought suddenly occurred to Logan. ‘This mean you stepped through that portal infected?’

‘Don’t worry,’ Sharee said. ‘I scanned before I stepped through – make sure there were no vulnerables around. I just get a yes or no answer, though. Seeing as the kids had already succubbed and you were infected already, I got a “no vulnerables” from my scan before I stepped through and found you guys.’

Remus looked down at her paper. ‘The public seem to have mixed reactions.’ She folded it up and tucked it away again. ‘But I suppose they always did that.’

Both Sharee and Grace snorted in amusement.

A male British-accented voice sounded from above. ‘I do hate to interrupt.’

The three women looked up.

‘Yes, JARVIS?’ Sharee asked.

‘You requested, on the advice of the Transcendent Soul Ethne Mac Giolla Bhighde, that I keep an eye on the movements of Steve Rogers.’

Oh, right. That was the guy that got enhanced in the 40s.

‘Yes,’ Sharee said.

‘He appears to be making some movements,’ JARVIS said. ‘He’s been declared a fugitive along with Miss Romanoff and dropped off of the grid.’

So something was going on.

‘I’d recommend sending someone in to check it out,’ Remus said.

‘Reuben?’ Grace asked.

‘That’s what I’m thinking,’ Sharee said. ‘And Ethne.’ She paused. ‘Let’s play it safe and send Joel in too.’

‘Joel?’ Remus asked. ‘Which one is he?’

Grace chuckled. ‘Used to be Emil Weber.’

‘Oh.’


	8. Two Situations at Once

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Tony, Helen and Bruce are devising a cure, the events of CA: Winter Soldier are taking place.

**New York**  
The blue glow of Virus X was cast on their faces.

‘I have to agree with them,’ Helen said. ‘There’s no way humans pulled this off by themselves in the 1700s. They definitely had someone helping them.’

‘I don’t understand why anyone would,’ Bruce stated.

Tony did though. ‘Because they could.’

***

 **Washington**  
Joel Cliffton sat on the laptop with another Transcendent, Zhen Tan, supplying them with the computerised data. His computer was also linked to JARVIS so Ton’y AI knew what was going on. It was always a good idea to know what you were running into before you ran into it. Reuben Magnessun returned to the café table with the cups of coffee and set them out.

‘What have we got?’ he asked.

‘Seems Rogers just found out what we’ve known since your infiltration,’ Joel said.

Reuben cocked an eyebrow. ‘And how did he find that out?’

‘They sent the Winter Soldier after him.’ Joel frowned. ‘Uh…Ethne?’

The Irishwoman frowned. ‘Don’t tell me it’s Bucky.’

‘Okay.’

‘Well, shite.’ She leaned over and pulled the laptop over to to take a look. ‘Rogers is really bad at adapting, so it was no surprise to me that he was the proverbial fish out of water here. In my opinion he’ll view this as a way to get back a piece of his past. Bucky was Rogers’ best friend and his minder. Anything that could get in the way of getting his buddy back will be ignored and dismissed.’

‘Which means he’s about to commit obstruction of justice.’ Reuben nodded. ‘And Black Widows are trained for survival. From all the records I know of this one, she’s not only extremely arrogant but she’s also extremely vindictive.’

‘So we better work out what’s going on before we have a disaster on our hands,’ Joel said.

‘I know what’s going on,’ Reuben said. ‘Project Insight is going on.’

***

 **New York**  
They were ready for the final test.

An artificial human – made up mostly of donated animal organs encased in a metal shell – lay on the exam table. Several cables and wires went into the husk for various purposes. Tony stood at the main computer screen, keeping an eye on the devices. Helen stood at the IV tube, ready to inject the salmon-coloured solution directly into the tissue. Bruce stood at a second screen, monitoring the tissue which had been strung with Gene X and infected with Virus X.

‘I think we’re as ready as we’re ever gonna be,’ Bruce said.

‘Right.’ Tony nodded. ‘Helen?’

Helen pressed the end of the needle into the plastic and injected the solution. The liquid in the bag took on the pinkish hue and then began to move through the tube. The three scientists waited and watched. At best, this would take hours. But they were both perfectly aware of that, and perfectly content to wait.

Cures didn’t happen overnight.

***

 **Brooklyn**  
Getting the photograph was a bitch of a task.

Had they known about this 70 years ago, they could have gotten one and retained it. Not legally, of course, but they’d have it. Just like what she was doing now wasn’t exactly legal. Trying to get a family photograph under false pretenses was most likely illegal in some states. Maybe even this one. She didn’t know. She was from Connecticut.

But it worked.

Sharee told the descendants of the Barnes family that she needed photos of James Barnes and his family for a documentary on the Howling Commandoes.

They gave her an envelope of them.

She delivered it to Ethne before returning to Manhattan.

***

 **New York**  
Sharee walked out of the lift to find Toby at the reception desk, filling out some paperwork.

‘Hi,’ she said. ‘Long time, no see.’

Toby glanced up. ‘ _Kalimera_.’ He handed the paperwork over. ‘Thank you, ma’am.’

The receptionist smiled pleasantly. ‘Thank you, Mr. Metaxas. Enjoy your time as one of Mr. Stark’s guests.’

He nodded equally as pleasantly and walked over to Sharee. The two of them both got back into the lift.

‘Found the Mind Stone in Sokovia, I hear,’ he remarked.

‘Yeah,’ she said.

‘What were HYDRA doing with it?’ It was asked more with curiosity.

‘Oh, my God!’ Sharee’s hand went to her head. ‘They were trying to make enhanced. They’d ended up killing most of their volunteers. But they’d just succeeded on two of them, and I had to call Kolya to come and strip their powers . I should have measured that little bitch on the decibel scale.’

‘So they threw a tantrum when they lost their powers?’ Toby asked, amused. It was something they’d all seen before.

‘She did. Her brother had the other reaction.’

Toby dipped into an impression of a whiney kid who’d had a privlage taken away. ‘“Why would you do that?!”’

‘Pretty much. Koyla ended up dumping them in a mental institution.’

‘Really? How come?’

‘Because when they were kids, their parents were killed by a stray piece of artillery that destroyed their apartment building.’

‘Isn’t Sokovia in the middle of a civil war?’

‘Yes. A second bomb landed in their view, that had Stark written across it. It did not explode.’ Sharee gave him a sardonic smile. ‘They decided that this meant that Tony Stark killed their parents. And they never let go of the idea. They volunteered for the HYDRA experiments as part of a revenge plot to kill Tony.’

Toby was silent a moment. Then he said, ‘Some people just shouldn’t be allowed out by themselves.’

Sharee snorted as the lift opened.

***

Logan had to lean on Remus when Dr. Cho called him to the med-bay.

When he arrived, he was directed to an examination table. His stomach still churned but there was nothing in it for him to toss. The lights had been dimmed but they still aggrevated the stabbing headache that’d plagued by him for over a week now. Leaning back, he vaguely noticed the monitors pick up things like his heartbeat and his temperature.

‘The good news,’ Stark said, ‘is that we have probably found the cure. The bad news is it’s untested on humans.’

Banner picked up. ‘However, all of our previous tests have come back positive and CDC has greenlighted it, providing we have your consent to do so.’

Logan looked over at the vial of salmon-pink liquid in Cho’s hand.

‘And the counteractant?’ he asked.

‘It’ll act more like a breathable vaccine; something you inhale instead of getting injected with,’ Cho said. ‘Providing this works, we can develop the counteractant from it and then release it into the air in all countries that have at least one Stark Industries factory.’

Logan sighed and nodded. ‘All right, let’s get this over with.’

Yanking his shirt over his head, his entirely body protested. Stark cracked a grin. Banner walked over and pushed him onto his back and took his arm. ‘It’ll be a lot safer if we inject it via an IV solution rather than directly into your bloodstream.’

Logan didn’t respond as he watched them.

The needle went in.

Stark’s hand suddenly went to his earpiece and his brow furrowed.

There was suddenly a rushing in Logan’s ears.

***

 **Washington**  
Three helicarriers had been dropped on the city of Washington DC. There were hundreds of crushed bodies underneath them, being optimistic, and the entire areas around them burned. All the files that had sat in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s databanks were out on the World Wide Web because Captain America did not understand technology and the Black Widow did not like being made a fool of.

Ethne watched as Bucky hauled Steve out of the water.

Joel was off containing the damage through his force-fields, while Reuben was utilising some of the “personal touches” he’d put into HYDRA when he’d infiltrated them in his last life to try and mitigate the damage those two morons had done. According to him, Rogers had simply gotten to Bucky at the end of the brainwashing cycle. Reuben hadn’t known everybody who was put through it, but he did know how it worked.

Bucky then stood and began to walk away.

Ethne moved around, shadowing him until they were sufficiently far away from Steve. All Steve saw was his best friend from Brooklyn. And he would want Bucky Barnes back. Ethne doubted, after what she’d heard, that he would ever be that man again. But maybe it was time for him to forge a new identity – away from the selfish git that was Steve Rogers.

Ethne stepped out. ‘James.’

He spun around defensively, hand going for any weapons he still had.

Ethne held up a photograph.

James Barnes froze as he viewed a picture of his own family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, Ethne was Steve's teacher in her previous life.
> 
> I looked up some Greek greetings to work out what Toby would say to Sharee. I hope I didn't butcher it.


	9. Cure and Rescue Operations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Logan is cured, but he immediately becomes involved in resolving the problems caused by the data dump.
> 
> The counteractant is released and the Transcendent Souls prepare for the re-unification.

First, he stopped sweating. The chills left him too. Then the headache faded away. The coughing stopped. He began to feel normal again. Logan’s normal appetite returned and he was able to move without the nausea or vomiting. When Dr. Cho cleared him, Logan knew precisely what was coming next. 

‘So I guess you’re pouring the counteractant into the air next?’ he asked.

‘ _We_ are,’ Cho said.

The emphasis on the pronoun caught Logan’s attention. ‘What d’you mean?’

Cho sighed. ‘Well, while we were sorting you out, there was something else going on. You heard of Captain America?’

‘That guy that got juiced up in the 40s?’ Logan asked. ‘Romulus mentioned him, yeah. Said he took a suicide dive.’

Dr. Cho gave him a bitter smile. ‘Well, he survived it. They found him in 2012 and thawed him out.’

That didn’t surprise him overly.

‘I don’t suppose your pocket dimension has a S.H.I.E.L.D. or a HYDRA?’

‘Nope.’ But he’d heard enough about them while he was here to know both were full of dickheads with slightly different agendas. 

‘If I may, Dr. Cho.’ JARVIS spoke from above. It still amazed Logan to think that this was an artifical intelligence. When she saw this, Kitty would have an absolute field day. ‘Mr. Rogers woke up in a completely different world and chose to reject the advancements society has made. This was likely not helped by the fact that S.H.I.E.L.D. elected to treat him as a weapon rather than a person and immediately put him back on the field without any counselling.’

‘Yes,’ Dr. Cho mused. ‘But S.H.I.E.L.D. always seemed to view mental health as something that could be exploited rather than something that should be treated.’

Man, they were bigger dickheads than he thought. 

JARVIS continued. ‘As far as Mr. Rogers has always been concerned, the enemy is HYDRA, and he recently learned that they have been within S.H.I.E.L.D. from the very beginning. He decided that the rational response to this was to have S.H.I.E.L.D.’s entire databanks dumped online and to have three helicarriers, easily weighing several hundred if not thousands of tonnes, fire on each other in the air. This, I should add, was while they were hovering over the city of Washington.’

Logan’s mind immediately latched onto the consequences of both of those decisions. ‘Oh, fuck.’

‘Pretty much.’ Dr. Cho put aside her iPad. ‘That’s why Remus isn’t here. She’s down in the workshop with Tony trying to extract as many people as possible.’

‘Well,’ Logan shrugged on his jacket. ‘It’s gonna be world-wide. It’s not like you can just run in and save people.’

‘Not yet, anyway. He’d like to see you down in the workshop’

Logan cocked an eyebrow.

***

Tony sat in the workshop, working as fast as he could.

Already, with JARVIS’s help, he’d gotten everything he could off the web, but none of that information would ever be safe again. It’d been downloaded hundreds of times. Tony and JARVIS had coordinated evacuating the civillians. Remus had shown that, despite what history would have you believe about women, had displayed that she had participated in coordinating the Roman army.

As a result, many of those civilians were safely sequestered in their nearest SI building.

‘Sir,’ JARVIS said, ‘Logan has finished his examination with Dr. Cho and is heading for the workshop as per your request.’

‘Good,’ Tony said.

Remus glanced up briefly.

A few minutes later, Logan stepped out of the lift and entered the workshop. When he wasn’t sick, he actually had quite an intimidating counterance. Despite his lack of height, he made up for it in bulk. The expression on his face would make Tony think twice about approaching him if he saw him in a bar. But, what was it Remus said?

_‘We’re naturally animalistic by nature. Added onto how people react to mutants in general and our sub-branch of mutants tend to cultivate a look designed to scare people away.’_

And Logan succeeded at that. He was all hard lines and suspicious looks and a scowl that screamed “try me”, and not in a good way. Tony found himself wondering who would win if Rogers and Logan came to blows. Somehow, he didn’t think the former would fare too well. And he had a strong desire to watch that.

‘The counteractant’s been delivered,’ Tony said. ‘Its scheduled to be released into the air in,’ he glanced at his watch, ‘approximately eight and a half hours. Grace is gonna wait one solar day after that before reversing the Order’s reality manipulation.’

‘And how’s that work?’ Logan asked in a gruff voice. ‘What happens to the land where the school is?’

‘School?’ Tony asked.

‘Sharee told me about this,’ Remus said. ‘In the 1960s, Professor Charles Xavier, a mutant himself, created a sanctuary and school for mutant children.’ She then answered Logan. ‘That’s another part of the reason why Sharee was checking on your pocket dimension, and the reason she took the Time Stone with her. She wanted to look at what was going to happen before her next visit.’

Tony turned, guessing where this was going. ‘You mean to tell me that for the past three hundred years, the Transcendent Souls have been manipulating the human race?’

Logan’s lips quirked into a smirk.

The lift behind him suddenly opened and Sharee, Grace, and Toby walked out. Everyone looked at them. They stopped. They looked at each other. And then they grinned sheepishly.

‘I take it you told them?’ Toby asked Remus.

Remus waved a hand. ‘Care to explain how the re-unification will work?’

‘Oh, that’s why. Right.’ Grace ran her hands over her hair. ‘When you split a dimension off, you keep it linked. You, in effect, create a parallel universe. Everything’s the same, but a little bit different. But when you bring them back together, the universe has to compensate for those differences.’

‘Compensate?’ Logan asked. ‘So the school...?’

‘Perfectly safe, I assure you,’ Toby said. ‘In his last life, Reuben organised it so that while HYDRA is resting their feet there now, when Grace does the re-unification they were never there in the first place. Chronologically, the Professor was there first. He owned the property when they went after it. They may have tried to repossess it, but Xavier founded the X-Men in 1963 and the school soon after. That’s over ten years before Reuben pointed their attention towards the place. How do you think Xavier would have reacted?’

From the eyebrow quirk Toby’s rhetorical question got, Tony would bet that HYDRA wouldn’t come out on top of that pissing contest. Tony could see what amused him. That house would have been full of super-powered individuals. And that would be if Reuben saw it fit to alert them to the existence of the place.

‘So, pretty much,’ Remus said, ‘the most layman way to put it is that you’re rewriting history.’

It didn’t seem a very accurate summary.

But Sharee said, ‘If it helps, yes.’

Was this another example of other people not being to keep up with Tony?

‘And that Trask dickhead?’ Logan asked.

‘Taken care of.’ Sharee turned her head and addressed Tony. ‘You’re welcome, by the way.’

Surprised, Tony’s head jerked back. ‘Huh?’

Sharee threw her head back and laughed.

***

 **2 Days Later**  
Grace stood on top of Stark Tower.

Logan and Remus had just taken off on motorbikes for Westchester. By the time they arrived, the X Mansion would be there. Grace had sat in the penthouse with the others and had watched the life-saving salmon-coloured gas roll across the New York skyline and then disperse into the atmosphere.

One solar day was long enough for the counteractant to spread through the air internationally; to meld into the air and bond to the oxygen and to the carbon dioxide. It was long enough for people to start breathing it in. When they returned, the mutants would instantly suck it into their lungs, thus immunising themselves – a breathable vaccine.

As she lifted her hand, Grace idly wondered what the medical term for that would be.

She clicked.

The Earth began to shake.

The two universes reunited after a separation of three centuries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like to point out that I do not understand quantum physics, and trying sends my head reeling. So I did the best I could.


	10. Reinforcements

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The two universes are reunited.
> 
> The X-Men get straight to work.

As soon as the shaking stopped, the Professor sent everyone outside – X-Men, teachers, and students alike.

Scott asked why as he followed the Professor out of the school.

‘The counteractant for the virus has been released into the very air itself,’ the Professor explained. ‘We need to inhale it and let it begin working within our bodies as quickly as possible.’

‘An airbourne vaccine?’ Romulus asked from his other side, sounding amused.

‘Very much so.’

‘Haw.’ Romulus lifted his head and sniffed. ‘Well, either way Logan and Remus are nearly here.’

They moved down to greet them. A few minutes after Romulus had made the announcement, two motorbikes pulled in through the gates of the mansion. As they stopped, many of the kids swarmed towards Logan. Logan may have been rough around the edges but there was no denying he had a soft spot for the kids. He might have made an excellent father. Scott had once asked him if he had any of his own, in one of their rare moments of civility.

Logan’s answer had surprised and saddened him. _‘Nah. I’m careful about that. Always have been. If I did have a kid and they inherited my mutation...Well, nature made me a freak, man made me a weapon, and God made it last too long.’_

That was a bit of a harrowing thought. Kind of made him wonder if Remus or Romulus ever had kids. Or if they’d cite the same reasons as Logan for not having any. Scott’s attention was drawn off of Logan and the kids as the other mutant got off the bike and walked towards Romulus. She must’ve been Remus but all of their similarities seemed superficial at best.

‘Hey, wolf-boy,’ she said.

‘Hey, wolf-girl.’ He returned the greeting and the two of them hugged. ‘All done, then?’

‘What gave that away?’ Remus chuckled and stepped back. ‘Well, I’d tell you all about it, but we’ve got another little problem.’

‘Little?’ Logan asked sceptically.

Remus nodded in acquiesence.

***

Charles sat at Cerebro, scanning the world for the burned S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

It was extremely foolish to burn the barn to get rid of a few rats. If he had the time, he might look over at them to see what this Captain America character had been thinking. As it was, he didn’t. Most of the civilians of the burned agents had been evacuated and given refuge in any nearby Stark Industries properties they could get to.

It must have been very disruptive to the business, but the decision had been made rashly and without any alternatives being considered. They did not even attempt to contact Dr. Stark with the issue, despite him being the most qualified to deal with it. The man just suddenly found himself having to save hundreds and hundreds of people. Not merely the agents, but their families as well. Dr. Stark had merely used what he had to make the most of an utter disaster that resulted from other people’s careless actions.

Most of the agents in the field had been captured or killed by those they were infiltrating. Most of the survivors were sitting in jail cells while they waited for Dr. Stark and his contacts to negotiate them out of the position they were in. Most of them would most likely only release the agents in exchange for something. For instance, Russia had agreed to release the agents they had into American custody in exchange for a few things – most especially the Black Widow.

The Black Widow was the one who dumped the files online, so no one was really that upset about it.

When they’d been planning, Logan had told Charles that Dr. Stark was waiting on contact from him. He knew who he was and he knew the contact would most likely be telepathic. So, Charles had initiated contact. The man himself seemed to be being run ragged. He was still looking for people and sifting through files. It didn’t help that certain people who’d been in command positions in S.H.I.E.L.D. were trying to get in on it.

‘Former Deputy Director Hill tried to get in,’ he had told him, electing to speak aloud rather than think it. ‘Remus was in the room for the meeting. Hill claimed that it was for the sake of penitence. Remus shook her head at me so I turned her away.’

 _Ah, yes,_ Charles thought to him. _The ability to smell the chemical change that takes place when a person tells a lie. I’ve seen Logan do the same thing.’_

‘So useful! Wish I could do that. It’d save so much trouble.’

Charles smiled to himself. _Did you find out what they really wanted?_

‘Yeah, they really wanted to keep an eye on me and keep me from finding too many of their secrets.’

Charles was instantly appalled. _Do you mean to tell me that they have countless agents and their families endangered and all they can think about is preserving their secrets?_

‘I never said they had their priorities in the right order.’

They certainly did not. In fact, many of the families of the agents had been captured before Tony and his AI, JARVIS, could get to them and were being used as leverage against the agents themselves. That was what the X-Men were doing. With Charles’s telepathy and Tony’s AI, the X-Men were sending in several missions to hit HYDRA right in all their blind spots.

Charles could only hope they’d covered all their bases.

***

HYDRA was attacked.

They never saw it coming and they found that they couldn’t fight back against that many powersets at once. HYDRA was cautious in their dealings with the Avengers, knowing they couldn’t defeat them in a frontal assault. But this assault came head on from an organised group that each member of had a different power – many of which they’d never seen before.

(They didn’t realise these were actually two factions usually at odds, who came together for a common purpose – albeit for slightly different reasons.)

Toddlers and small children being rescued by their families giggled at the sight of all the bad men being dragged half-way down through the floor and getting stuck there, at their captors being thrown through the air, of them being batted around by the butts of their own rifles. The adults were just relieved to be getting out and to safety, whether they be agents or the families of the agents.

HYDRA seemed under attack from all of mutantkind.

***

 **Westchester**  
Having just come out of a hot shower, Logan walked down to the common room.

Most of the other X-Men were slumped in one position or another. Everyone had spent the past few weeks on one rescue mission after the other. They were all exhausted. Chuck had expressed his pride in them and given them all time to kick their feet up. Even Romulus and Remus were resting. They were sitting on the couch in front of the TV with a pack of beers.

Romulus saw him first and pulled a fresh one out. He held it up in offering.

Logan grinned and walked over. ‘Thanks.’ He took the beer and sat down with them. ‘What are you watching?’

‘The Senate hearing for the Info Dump,’ Remus said. ‘The Black Widow is the only one that bothered to show up.’

Logan scoffed. ‘What I’ve heard about Cap, I’m not surprised.’

‘From Ethne?’ Romulus asked.

Logan shrugged as Remus said, ‘Well, she was one of his teachers in her last life. She’d be the most reliable source of information pertaining to him, wouldn’t she?’

Whatever Romulus had been about to say was interrupted when Romanoff made a very bold statement in response to a question she was asked. ‘You’re not going to put me in prison. You’re not going to put any of us in prison. Do you know why?’

‘Do enlighten us,’ the chairman of the hearing said, a dangerous edge to his voice.

Romanoff smirked. ‘Because you need us. Yes, the world is a vulnerable place. And, yes, we did help make it that way. But we’re also the ones best qualified to defend it. So if you want to arrest me, arrest me. You’ll know where to find me.’ She went to stand up, but the chairman took her invitation.

The shock on her face was fleeting but all three lupines saw it.

Logan blew out a low whistle. ‘I’ve seen some arrogant assholes before, but she just took the cake.’

Romulus nodded. ‘And she got caught with her pants down.’

***

 **New York**  
Tony hadn’t even realised he’d fallen asleep.

He just woke up on the penthouse couch with a pillow under his head and a blanket thrown over him. Pepper was sitting just next to him, typing away at her laptop. He sat up and groggily rubbed his neck. ‘How long was I out?’

‘Not long enough for my tastes,’ Pepper said. ‘How do you feel?’

‘I’m all right.’ He looked at her. ‘How are we looking?’

Pepper sighed. ‘The only burned agents we have yet to secure a deal for are the ones in North Korea. The FBI has advised us not to hold out hope that they’ll still be alive. I responded with the fact that the least we can do is return their bodies to their families.’

Tony smiled tightly and stretched. ‘Has Romanoff been turned over yet?’

‘Yes,’ Pepper said. ‘Another of the Transcendent Souls, Kolya Zima, was waiting to escort her back to Russia after her disaster of a senate hearing.’

Tony snorted in amusement.

‘Do you regret it?’ Pepper asked after a moment of silence.

‘What?’ Tony asked. ‘Not protecting Natashalie?’ At her nod, he sighed. ‘Not particularly. She was a necessary evil – someone I had to deal with when the Avengers came together. I thought that the Avengers were needed because of the impending invasion, then I found out that there was an entire sub-species of natural enhanced. What’s the first thing they do upon arrival? They find out the problem and they rush in to help. They mow over HYDRA like it’s the front lawn. What the hell do we need Romanoff for?’

Pepper nodded. ‘Added to the fact that she was meant to be watching those agents backs and she stabbed them in it without warning.’

‘Exactly! I’m more concerned about what happens to them than I am about what happens to her.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Magneto did research on HYDRA (after Charles asked his help) and discovered they'd been experimenting to enhance baseline humans. You can imagine how he responded to that.


	11. Out of the Woodwork

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the re-unification complete, it's time to prepare for the coming invasion.

‘So, why haven’t we heard anything of Trask since the re-unification?’ Jean asked.

‘Because, as the Transcendent Souls said, they essentially rewrote history,’ Charles explained. ‘Trask never got off the ground. When he first suggested the Senteniels, one of the Starks – which I’m not precisely sure – stood up in the conference and questioned how much the project was going to cost. When Trask failed to give a satisfactory anyswer, he then questioned the effectiveness of the machines based on the fact that mutants tend to live among large populations.’

Kitty nodded. ‘Yeah, Tony told me about this. It was his dad.’ She’d been absolutely delighted to meet an engineer of Tony’s calibre, and one that didn’t think less of her for being a mutant. ‘By raising concerns about money and public safety – concerns which Trask was never able to put down – he essentially killed the project.’ She frowned. ‘Hey, why didn’t we ever try that?’

Scott pulled a face. ‘It seems sort of underhanded to use peoples’ money against them.’

‘Underhanded, yes,’ Charles said. ‘But through speaking with Dr. Stark, I came to realise a critical error we were making. We were trying to use logic to argue with an emotional crowd. It was never going to work. Not until somebody calmed them down, and nobody was inclined to calm them down. Now somebody is. Dr. Stark was raised in the spotlight. He knows how to work a crowd. Before we say our piece, we need to let him say his. We need to let him manipulate the crowd so that they are calm enough to listen to us.’

Scott was silent for a moment. Then he sighed. ‘Where are Logan and the Wonder Twins?’

‘I had to send them to Srgt. Barnes,’ Charles said. ‘He’s been tracked down, I’m afraid. Even though he had me nullify the triggers in his brain, he is still suffering from post-traumatic stress. They thought it better they go to stop that faction of HYDRA before they arrived at the hospital.’

 **Across the Country**  
It hadn’t gone exactly according to plan.

Logan, Remus, and Romulus ended up having to flick out their claws and inflict some permanent injuries. They now had to lay low while Stark smoothed everything over. Logan didn’t see why. The guy wasn’t involved in the operation. Why should he have to explain their behaviour to the big guns?

‘Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,’ Romulus said when Logan said as much.

Remus then added. ‘And be sure to say “thank you” when you see him next.’

Logan had chuckled at that.

Then, Barnes had asked to talk to them. Apparently, he’d been able to see the whole thing from his window and he had questions. It was fair enough – the guy was probably twitchy about anyone with any form of enhanced condition – and it gave them something to do to pass the time. So, they went. Barnes was sitting at a table in a common room, his metal arm removed and tapping away at a laptop with his remaining arm.

‘You’re enhanced?’ he asked, reeking of nervousness.

‘We’re mutants,’ Romulus said. ‘We’re a sub-branch of humanity born with a gene that gives us powers.’

Barnes looked them over. ‘Like that guy that numbed the triggers in my brain?’

‘We were sent by him,’ Remus said. ‘We had rather hoped that stop the attack before it came to your door, so to speak.’

Bucky nodded slowly. ‘The effort is appreciated.’

The nervousness seemed to be subsiding. Logan pulled out a cigar and lit it. ‘How’re you doing in the joint anyway?’

‘Pretty good,’ Barnes said. ‘I’ve started remembering things from Brooklyn. I don’t think it was Steve’s presence alone that brought me back to myself, though.’

‘I wouldn’t expect so,’ Remus said. ‘The power of emotional connection breaking external control is a romantic idea, but I’ve yet to see any solid evidence of such a phenomenon. However, the brain does fight back against brainwashing – that, I have seen.’

Romulus nodded in agreement. ‘More likely than not, Rogers repeated a familiar action to you at the tail end of the cycle – right when the brainwashing was weak enough for your mind to be fighting back. That’s also why you recognised the people in the photos when Ethne showed them to you.’

Barnes nodded. ‘I thought it was something like that.’ He paused. ‘I am worried about Steve actually finding me here though. I mean, HYDRA did so...’

‘I wouldn’t worry,’ Logan assured him. ‘Rogers is resistant to technology, which is exactly how they tracked you.’ He shrugged. ‘Besides, Cliffton’s hauling him in by now.’

‘How?’ Barnes asked.

‘Mr. Rogers only has peak human condition,’ Remus said. ‘But Joel Cliffton has supernatural condition, to go along with the absolute defence he used to contain the explosions caused by three Helicarriers crashing into the city of Washington.’

Barnes was silent for a moment. ‘I wondered about that.’

***

Toby stood and waited as Ethne and Joel discussed what to do with the unconscious super-soldier the latter had brought in with the authorities.

‘Already,’ Joel was saying, ‘Rogers attempted to flee me three times. I did explain to him that he had to answer for his actions, that the public demanded an explanation, but all I got was,’ he put on an obviously-fake American accent, ‘“oh, the people know I was protecting them! We had to stop HYDRA!”; “we can’t save everybody”.’ He retook this lifetime’s natural British accent. ‘The man cannot be reasoned with and he has already shown an alarming lack of concern for casualties. He does not even _attempt_ to mitigate the damage.’

‘I agree,’ Ethne said. ‘Dropping those Helicarriers displayed a tremendous disregard for the people underneath them. Even if he didn’t understand the consequences of dropping government files online, he certainly would have understood what happens when weight drops down on top of people. He just didn’t care. And then he didn’t even show up for his hearing. Think about where Mr. Cliffton found him. This man is clearly a flight risk.’

The officer in charge sighed and scratched his head. ‘It’s not that I disagree with you,’ he said. ‘I just don’t see how we’ll hold him. With his strength...well, there are doubts that even our strongest cells can hold him in.’

Toby pushed himself from the wall. ‘I can help with that.’

The officer looked at him. ‘How?’

‘I’m the one who told Tony Stark about S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Index.’ An exposed secret that was currently going viral all over the internet. ‘How do you suppose I found out?’

The federal officer nodded. ‘You’re an enhanced.’

‘Specifically, I can alter the laws of science,’ Toby said. ‘I can make any bonds and prison cells strong enough to withstand the enhanced strength that Rogers exhibits and then some.’

The officer looked thoughtful, and then he slowly nodded. ‘Give me a moment.’ He stepped out of the room for a few minutes before coming back in. ‘You’re being granted permission to temper everything that will be used to detain Captain America.’

***

Danny Rand had agreed to this meeting, but he never imagined that was what this was about.

Not only did Tony Stark know that he was Iron Fist, but he also showed him some footage taken by the Iron Man suit during the Battle of New York. There wasn’t a lot after he went through the portal but what Danny did see caused an uneasy feeling to settle in his gut. That...armarda would have flown onto earth.

Danny knew, from his own life experiences, that cutting off one access point did not stop one’s enemies from finding other ways to attack you. Whatever that battle was about, it wasn’t over. Not by a long shot. And they needed to be ready for Round 2.

‘Did you show the other Avengers this?’ Danny asked.

‘Oh, they weren’t interested,’ Stark remarked bitterly, sitting back. ‘As far as they were concerned, we’d won and that was that. Bruce looked but he said he didn’t see much so I shouldn’t be jumping at shadows.’

‘Jumping at shadows?’ Danny demanded. ‘That was a goddamn _armada_. That was an army coming after this planet!’ He could actually see why Stark had begun looking around for others to help him fight. He probably should have started earlier, but the lack of support from that so-called team may have contributed to his reluctance. Danny was sort of glad they were all sitting behind bars. He slapped his hand on the table and sighed. Then he looked up, ‘Stark, do you mind if I take a copy of that footage? I know some others who would probably want in.’

‘Sure,’ Stark said. ‘We need all the help we can get. J?’

A British-accented voice came from some device on Stark’s person. ‘I have just sent a copy of the footage to your phone, Mr. Rand.’

Danny flicked out his phone and quickly found the footage in question.

***

Tony leaned against the balcony wall and sighed.

It had been easier when he found superheroes in the same status as he was. He found Rand because he’d been on S.H.I.E.L.D.’s watch-list due to an incident with him disappearing for an extended period of time. They had nothing concrete to suggest he’d become enhanced in any way, but they’d listed him for the possibility of such. It didn’t help that he hung around Hell’s Kitchen where the corrupt authorities were certain they’d get more money for protecting his hide and not saying anything to any enquiries into the matter.

Tony’s own...enquiries had garnered far more results and he’d realised that Rand was not only enhanced, but an active superhero.

He was potential help.

So, Tony did the sensible thing.

He organised a business meeting.

Danny Rand and his other super friends had agreed to help Tony in stopping the threat. They’d also pointed him in the direction of other super-heroes. Turned out New York was crawling with enhanced – of both the good and bad variety. With S.H.I.E.L.D. gone (despite Fury and Coulson’s best attempts), they were far more open to coming out of the shadows.

On the outside, though, it looked like just a normal collaboration between two companies.

Tony was torn out of his thoughts as something caught his eye. Looking up to the New York skyline, Tony squinted. Was he seeing what he thought he was seeing? ‘J? Am I really overtired, or am I seeing Carol Danvers flying towards this tower without an aircraft?’

‘Scanners and facial recognition would indicate that is Carol Danvers, sir,’ JARVIS said. ‘And that she is performing self-sustained flight.’ His voice took on the dry tone. ‘It would seem there was an explanation for her disappearance in the 90s, after all.’

Carol came down and landed on the other end of the balcony from Tony.

‘Sorry about the intrusion, Mr. Stark,’ she said. ‘I need to be sure the rumours of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s demise were true.’

Tony recovered quickly if he did say so himself. ‘Yup. Crashed and burned. And we’re keeping them that way. So where have you been?’

‘Off-world.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It think it makes more sense for Tony to go to Danny Rand rather than Matt Murdock when it comes to the Defenders, for exactly the reasons mentioned here.


	12. An Army Prepared

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the arrival of Captain Marvel, they finally have a name and reputation to work from.

‘He’s called Thanos,’ Carol Danvers said. ‘He’s notorious for going to planets, wiping out half of their populations, and then kidnapping the children he orphans. He then indoctrinates them into an army not unlike the Jannisary Infantry.’

‘How do you know that?’ Rhodey asked.

‘Because the training didn’t take with everyone. Escapees can be quite vocal when given the opportunity to talk.’

Tony looked over at the six Transcendent Souls that were hanging around the room.

‘And he wants to gather the Infinity Stones?’ Sharee asked.

Carol nodded. ‘He was known to have one and, if the Battle of New York was the Chitauri, he had the Mind Stone as well up until that point.’

Joel frowned. ‘A race he wiped out?’

‘One of the early ones, from what I hear, from before he worked out how to kill quite so effectively. Word in the stars is that they’ve been in his service for generations.’

Bruce gave a bitter smile. ‘I guess that explains why Thor couldn’t pinpoint their point of origin.’

Carol frowned. ‘Thor? As in the Norse God of Thunder? That Thor?’

‘Yeah.’ Tony shrugged. ‘Looks like the Norse Gods, at least, are just aliens that primitive man took for Gods.’

Carol nodded. ‘That makes sense. But if he knew their name, why didn’t he know their backstory?’

‘Because,’ Sharee answered that one, ‘despite what they seem to think, Asgard only has contact with nine realms in total, including their own. They think that’s all the galaxy consists of.’

‘How do you know that?’ Happy asked.

‘I went to talk to Jane and Darcy,’ Sharee said. ‘Jane and I got to talking about Asgard. She once asked Thor why there were only nine realms and he told her that’s all the galaxy consists of.’

Carol smirked. ‘Arrogant, aren’t they? I mean, how long did it take us to map out every land mass on this planet?’

‘Point,’ Reuben said with a nod of his head, ‘but they came here and were taken for Gods. It’s a pretty common phenomenon, but then they went on to conquer the rest of the seven worlds – presuming that none of them took them for Gods too – and some people do have the kind of mentality wherein that would make the “Gods” idea go to their heads. It’s basically the same thing that happened with Rogers.’

Carol studied them for a moment before nodding. ‘Well, your powers didn’t go to your heads.’

‘If they did,’ Grace said, ‘we’d lose them.’

‘And the Soul Stone gave you the powers? Why you?’

Toby gave her a light grin. ‘I could respond with “why not?” but it’s a legitimate question. We’re not the only ones who were tried out for it. We’re simply the only ones who passed all of the trials. We’re the only ones who didn’t let the power, as we just said, go to our heads. The rule is simple: abuse it, lose it.’

‘But why Terra?’ Carol asked. ‘The planet’s so obscure.’

‘Who knows?’ Sharee shrugged. ‘Maybe the Soul Stone just happened to be here when it decided it needed a defence force.’

***

The number of enhanced was astonishing.

They came from all over the world and gathered around the two Infinity Stones that had come to rest on planet Earth – or Terra, depending on your perspective. The Twelve Transcendent Souls led the defensive assault on the invading forces. The lupine mutants, such as Remus, Romulus, and Logan, took the front line.

Tony had built a barrier that could not be penetrated from the outside, but those inside could fire any form of attack out.

Thanos’s army was dwindled down. They may have had superior numbers, five to one, but the Terran enhanced were capable of taking out several enemies at once. The only enhancements they faced were enhanced physical condition and immunity to mental tampering. The invaders were not prepared for the vast array of powers the inhabitants of this primitive and isolated little world.

Then Thanos stepped up.

He stood toe-to-toe with the Transendent Souls.

His followers got cocky.

It didn’t last long.

***

Tony watched through the scanners as Thanos’s fleet limped home, with their tails between their legs. His brain was already working out what would happen when word got out that their tiny little remote planet had fought off the Mad Titan. When Carol and Rhodey approached him, he guessed that was what Carol would want to talk about.

Rhodey clapped him on the shoulder. ‘You did it, Tones.’

‘Well,’ Tony mused, ‘I didn’t do it by myself.’

‘No,’ Carol said. ‘But when Remus asked, you did agree to help. You, Bruce, and Helen poured sweat and blood into finding a way to save the entirety of mutantkind. And you did it. And then you, specifically, reached out to all the enhanced you could find. You found the Transcendent Souls. You made the call to arms and you made this possible.’

‘To be fair,’ Tony said, ‘they found me.’

Carol chuckled and remarked to Rhodey. ‘You’re right. He can’t take credit for anything!’ She grinned at Tony. ‘More than that, you’ve made this world safe for enhanced again.’

Tony frowned. ‘We’ll still got a long way to go.’

‘Maybe so.’ Charles Xavier joined the conversation as he guided his specialised wheelchair over to them. ‘But the Accords have taken us further than we’ve ever gone before. I think you expect too much of yourself, Tony. You have done something rather admirable and fully worthy of praise.’

‘I would agree,’ Magneto said from side him.

‘Really?’ Tony cocked any eyebrow. ‘I thought you disapproved of people who used powers they weren’t born with.’ In fact, it’d taken him a while to warm up to the Transcendent Souls based on how much they _didn’t_ fit into his world view. He evidently couldn’t work out if their powers were natural or not.

Magneto gave a sharp smile. ‘I do. But desperate times do call for desperate measures.’

‘I can see that.’ Remus walked over and slapped Tony on the shoulder. ‘So, what’s next for you?’

‘Well,’ Tony rubbed the back of his neck, ‘I have no doubt that this is gonna change our planet’s reputation somewhat, so we have to be ready for that. Might want to talk to the UN about it.’

‘We can take that bit,’ Rhodey said. ‘Carol and I are both military and Carol knows what it’s like out there.’

Tony nodded. ‘Then I guess I better return to my roots. Iron Man needs to go back to doing what he was originally created for.’

‘You were better as a solo act anyway, Tones,’ Rhodey told him.

***

Mystique waited until they were driving away. ‘You really don’t mind Iron Man?’

Magneto was silent as he contemplated his answer. ‘I do not. He did not become Iron Man out of any desire for power. He created the Iron Man suit first as a means of survival in what seemed a hopeless situation. Did you read the records of his little...adventure in Afghanistan?’

Mystique shook her head.

‘He was betrayed and had a hit placed on his head by a man he trusted,’ Magneto said. ‘The first of three assasination attempts by the man. Rather than killing him, though, the insurgents took him prisoner and tried to force him to build them weapons. He was in their custody, and presumed dead, for three months. The prototype for the Iron Man armour came out of this time – as did his discovery that his weapons were being illegally sold to national enemies.’

Mystique was silent.

Magneto went on. ‘He became Iron Man to clean up the mess that he and his father made. No other reason. Why should I protest a human having a conscience about war?’

‘And the Founders of the West?’ Mystique asked.

‘They are mutants.’ Magneto shrugged. ‘A 2000-year-old woman trusted him with our lives, and he came through for us. I would call them reliable judges of character.’

‘And that’s it?’

‘Nothing more to add.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I figured I did the whole Transcendent Souls vs. Thanos think in Break a Bad Habit, so I just leave it up to the imagination here.


End file.
